A performance by singer Robbie Fulks that aired live on public radio's "A Prairie Home Companion" included a line in one of his songs that prompted an apology from Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) ahead of Sunday's rebroadcast of Garrison Keillor's show.

Country songwriter Robbie Fulks sang "Where I Fell" about 50 minutes into the nationally broadcast show Saturday evening at the Fitzgerald Theater in St. Paul, and with it the blasphemy that ends with the syllable "damn."

Before the late-morning rebroadcast Sunday to MPR's listeners, an apology was aired and the word was bleeped out the second time around.

"Prairie Home" spokesman David O'Neill said the show issued a "language advisory" soon after the live broadcast Saturday to 670 local stations across the country about the word.

"The program directors ... then make that call," about how to deal with language concerns, O'Neill said.

MPR spokeswoman Angie Andresen said the decision to bleep the word "is something we do on occasion with certain words, especially when children are likely to be listening with their families."

Paul Walsh • 612-673-4482